Adobe Countersued By International Typeface Corp. and Agfa Monotype Corp.

Wednesday, October 16, 2002

Press release from the issuing company

October 16, 2002 -- (WhatTheyThink.com) -- According to documents Adobe filed yesterday with the Securities and Exchange Commission, International Typeface Corp. and Agfa Monotype has filed a lawsuit against Adobe which is a result of a claim for arbitration Adobe filed against the two companies in September.
Adobe has asked the U.S. District Court in San Jose, Calif., for declaratory relief to resolve a contractual dispute that Adobe has the right to permit its customers to embed ITC (International Typeface Corporation) fonts in electronic documents. Adobe also filed an arbitration proceeding in London seeking affirmation of the same contractual rights with respect to Monotype fonts. Adobe says that it attempted to resolve this matter informally with Monotype and ITC without success.
Both International Typeface and Agfa Monotype are units of Belgian based Agfa-Gevaert N.V. The lawsuit against Adobe claims that Adobe's distribution of the superceded 5.0 version of Acrobat violated the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. Adobe has asked the court to declare that Acrobat does not violate certain provisions of the Act.
Agfa Monotype and ITC are asking for damages of $200 to $2,500 for each copy of Acrobat 5.0 found to violate the Act and injunctive relief. Dow Jones reported that the companies alleged Adobe breached the agreements by allowing end users of Adobe font software programs to distribute an unlimited number of copies of electronic documents with Adobe font software that generates typefaces embedded in those documents.
Conversely, Adobe claims it obtained written licenses from both companies.